Starting Chemo May 2015

Labhusky, I think each of us needs to find her balance between enough information and too much information. I find it frightening at times to look at all the side effects. I decided I want to know what to watch for and report to my MO, but not all to worry about the less-likely ones happening.

Most of the April and March women who have had chemo side effects have had the more common ones (like nausea, constipation or diarrhea, fatigue and hair loss). I have not had hives from taxotere (I'm not taking herceptin). When the pharmacy cut my steroid, my face flushed when the infusion started. Though I was thinking , "Yikes! Anaphylaxis!", the solution was to stop the drip, monitor my blood pressure and any other symptoms (there were none), give me the missing part of the steroid dose, and restart the infusion (with no problems). That's been the worst of the chemo for me, and it wasn't bad. Thus far on TC I've had hair loss, nail discoloration, diarrhea, slight sore throat, slight dry eyes, a runny nose, metallic taste in my mouth, fatigue, some twitchy muscles on the port side, dehydration, and Neulasta-related bone pain and discomfort in my BMX sites. When I write it out like that it looks like a lot, but none of it has been very bad or has stopped me from walking on the treadmill every day, eating, working, or generally being in my life. Some other people have certainly had fewer side effects, and some have had worse. I think the big take-aways from the April group are to insist on Neulasta or Neupogen and to keep your fluids up. These, and whatever exercise you can do, are the generic interventions that seem to help decrease the most side effects!

I believe it is a cryptic reference to the chemo room - sort of tongue in cheek since it is the antithesis of a spa day.

Labhusky, I wish you well, but expecting to feel healthy might be setting the bar a bit high for this journey. Even those with minimal side effects generally have some fatigue and some of the other discomforts, just to a lesser degree. Plan to need time to let your body rest and recover and don't worry if you can't do everything you normally do.

Has anyone tried the Elasto-Gel Cold Cap...with success vs. the Penguin Cold Caps? I feel the Elasto gel might be easier to use, but not sure of the results? thank you.

Getting ready for chemo on Monday...I went to the dentist and had my teeth cleaned and checked. My Oncologist said no dentist during chemo

Amysfw, I am starting Thursday as well on TC. If you don'tind sharing, what was your Oncotype score? Mine was 24. Just picked up all chemo meds (antinausea, steroid, ativan). Pretty depressing!

Wow ~ this thread has gotten busy. It looks like I'm in good company. I meet with my MO tomorrow and will hopefully find out my ER/PR, HER2 status as well as probable chemo start date and what my cocktail will be. I expect mine to be very aggressive because of the nodes. I know I definitely want to get a port. I'll check in again tomorrow when I know more. Good luck to all of you starting this week. I wish you all minimal SEs.

eaglemom, again good luck with your MO tomorrow.

Scarlett152, hope all goes well on Thursday. Please let us know how you are doing. I start TC a week after you.

StefLove, I start on the 14th too, hopefully we can all check in, compare notes and cheer each other on.

My first chemo is at 10;45 am. Anyone know if I am supposed to eat before or not? I'll have to read through my ever growing file of information and notes but I can't recall anything about this unless I totally forgotten it.

Thanks all.

Well just scheduled my port surgery for Monday! Any words of wisdom from everyone? It's at 1pm, which kinda sucks bc I have to be fasting but I didn't want to wait any longer. How will I feel the rest of the day? The rest of the week? Does it get in the way?

Scarlett, I did it right today. I ate some oatmeal with almond milk this morning and now I'm in my 1st treatment now. So far the only meds I have are benadril, Tylenol and anti nausea. We haven't gotten to the biggies yet. The port is in my arm and I can move my arm. That's nice.

Steflove, where are you having your port put? I had mine in my arm last Friday. 45 minute procedure. Checked in at 10 was out at 2. They put you in a light sleep. My brother and I went for coffee afterward. I was drowsy and sore. Tylenol was fine for me

Thanks Scarlett152, I will eat a light meal then.

I had a fun day today - went to a wig and mastectomy boutique run by two wonderful ladies...bought two wigs, three mastectomy bras, one prosthesis, one hat and one scarf. I love my wig (one is on order) I have been trying it on with earrings, etc. It's shorter than my real hair but I too am planning on getting my hair cut shorter before I start chemo. Spent a fortune but thankfully I will get most of it back from insurance. Then DH took me out for lunch!

So, my advice.... If you can, treat yourselves, even if it's to 'C' related stuff....did me a power of good today.

I had my consultation with my MO today. It went very well and I really like him. He was great; answered just about all my questions before I had to ask and laid out all my options with numbers to back them up and didn't push anything. My prognosis is better than I had thought. Great news on hormone and protein receptor status; ER/PR+++ (8/8 Allred score on both), HER2- ~yay! He said my mom's ovarian cancer and my breast cancer is enough reason to order genetic testing for me. HRT should be pretty effective and I have a couple of different options for chemo. I could either go with DD AC/T or DC; a gen 2 chemo. The DC would be 4 3-week cycles and the DD AC/T would be 4 2-week cycles of each, so either 3 months of easier or 4 months of harder chemo. With the DD AC/T I would probably be getting Neupogen.My MO said that the Neupogen cost is not covered by our provincial health care but there is a program by the drug company to subsidize the cost for those of us without extended health insurance. Basically, they make enough money on the drugs (Neulasta, etc) that they can afford to give some away cheaply.

My s-i-l will be here in a couple days. I spoke with her on the phone after my appointment today and she told me she did the DD AC/T 7 years ago and had an easier time with the AC than the T. My other s-i-l, who is a doctor and just went through DCIS, will talk with her MO about my path results to get a second opinion about my treatment choices.

I will go to chemo teach while I'm here in Victoria on Friday and see about the possibility of getting my surgeon back home to put a port in for me before he goes away in a week and a half. I don't have my first chemo session scheduled yet, but things are starting to fall into place and once I've decided which way to go, I'm sure it won't be too long..

labhusky, I'll be getting the port near my collarbone on the left side (the right side has the breast cancer). I think this part freaks me out the most, and then of course my surgeon didnt make it any better when he was telling me possible complications during the procedure. The fact that I'll be able to feel this in my body just gives me the creeps.

My port goes in tomorrow. They gave me a choice of back of the arm or collar bone. I went with collar bone. Monday is chemo day. This weekend is spending time with my daughter and her family on Saturday in Minneapolis....shopping for hats and sunscreen shirts. Sunday, my son...the one who volunteered to do chemo with me...is coming. So relaxing before chemo.

shanann and tjh, I wasn't given the choice of my arm but I think I'd go with collarbone anyway. I'll be thinking of you ladies!

mysunshine, My aunt went through this a few years ago and she didn't have a port. She had AC+T and didn't have any problems. She said it was annoying after awhile but she also had a lot more treatments then you will it seems. If your MO says no port, I'd trust them!